


Home and Family

by BleedingCoffee



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: AU, FMAWeek2015
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-25
Updated: 2015-03-25
Packaged: 2018-03-19 14:25:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3613314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BleedingCoffee/pseuds/BleedingCoffee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU where Father succeeds on the Promised Day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Home and Family

**Author's Note:**

> For FMAWeek2015 on Tumblr. Day 6 prompt: Home and Family.
> 
> It could have been a sweet and fluffy response to this prompt but here is some pain instead.

* * *

 

Home and Family

* * *

 

_Five years after the Promised Day_

 

Alphonse Elric crawled over the toppled bookshelves and paused as she looked back at him. He froze, holding his breath and not blinking until she started moving again, then slipped off the book case and tip toed forward as she turned the corner. Then he made the sound, the universal sound that all cats seemed to respond to, a call he had mastered well. He would get this cat and her kittens out of the library.

 

“Oh my God Al, leave the damned cat!”

 

Al cringed as his brother's voice broke the silence in the abandoned South City Library. He could hear it echo across the huge room and then heard the cat scamper away with her sardine treat. All hope was lost, he was never going to catch her now. So he sighed and climbed out of the destroyed aisle, noting that it was the section with the books on water alchemy in case they needed to return for any of those. That was the last of the sardines too.

 

“I swear, it's like you never grow up.”

 

Al glared at his older brother who was now 21 years old. “Funny from someone who never grew either.”

 

“Short jokes.” Ed mumbled. “Wow, those don't get old. Maybe you should quit hanging around with Mustang's herd of kids if you're going to keep up that juvenile crap.”

 

Al when over to the section where Ed was rooting around, picking up titles and then throwing them over his shoulder like trash. “Can you please be careful? Those are priceless, especially now.”

 

“They're not what we need.” Ed pulled another armful of books out and scanned the titles. “We don't have time to mess around. If we're successful than it won't matter anyway. ”

 

Al nodded and started to dig through the ruined library stacks to see if they could find anything that would help. They were running out of time, the doll soldiers could show up at any time and without Mustang they had to resort to simply blocking and out-maneuvering the creatures. She he sat down in the library and looked around at the birds nests, cobwebs and dust that had invaded the one pristine structure.

 

It was how the last five years had been, as they traveled across an empty Amestris looking for a way to try to make things right. The Promised Day had come and gone, Father emerging the victor and he had since moved on to conquering other countries. What he left in his wake was heart-wrenching. The people in the protective bubble near Father's lair had lived, but everyone else still lay soulless and dead where they fell: _everyone_ they failed.

 

Hohenheim had died that day, taking with him the only chance they had at defeating Father. How Father knew about _their_ father's plans, they weren't sure. They assumed he had absorbed Hohenheim and his thoughts and memories, thus revealing the man's intentions and allowing him to kill him shortly after all their gates were opened. Once upon a time he couldn't sleep because he wasn't in a human body, now that he had his body back he couldn't sleep because he replayed that day over and over again.

 

So, in the aftermath, they were left to try and find a way to defeat him while contending with the doll soldiers that poured out of Central Command with no more people to kill. The human survivors were hunted as they tried to flee the capital. It was easier said than done as they were all damaged: Hawkeye's throat had been cut, Mustang was skewered and blind, Izumi spewing blood out in volumes, Scar injured from his battle with Bradley and Ed battered from battle with Father. He was still in his armor and it was in pieces.

 

Even after they left Central City, they weren't safe. Izumi's health took a beating after her gate was opened and they raided pharmacies to keep her stocked on pills. Mustang was blind and his gloves were deteriorating from use and being sliced open by Bradley's swords. Hawkeye needed to recover, her wound was still very serious, which lead to a very protective and panicked blind Roy who never wanted to put her down or leave her side. Greedling and May went back to Xing to try to warn them of Father's intentions to start conquering each new country in order to gain more power. Jerso, Darius and Zampano did their best to protect them.

 

Al's armor was getting too thin to repair and his blood seal was deteriorating. Ed eventually gave up his alchemy to fulfill his promise. Since blood seal was fading, all Al could recall was blinking in and out of consciousness. His time was up and Ed made a sacrifice to make sure he wasn't lost forever. His brother gave up alchemy at the one time he needed it most. So after he got his body back, it was his turn to become the alchemist his brother was.

 

However this world that they lived in now was far from the world he knew. In the beginning it was horrifying as they encountered dead everywhere. Then the bodies began to decompose. They fled Central to get away from the horrors and also the doll soldiers. They kept running. All hope rested on their shoulders, the remaining four: A sick woman, a blind man, an alchemist who couldn't use alchemy and a boy who was in a emaciated body.

 

That was then. Now they simply had to content with the skeletons and abandoned buildings. Structures falling into disrepair, water sources tainted, hunting for food and plans that still weren't any closer to succeeding than they were five years ago. The key, they determined, was how Father used five human sacrifices to open the gates in order to open Earth's gate. That meant two things: The first was that they needed another sacrifice and the second was that they had to take control of Earth's gate.

 

Their chosen fifth sacrifice was Scar. Initially the Ishvalian scoffed at the plan, reciting so many reasons it couldn't be him that was the chosen one. They knew he understood alchemy and alkhestry. They knew Scar could wield both with ease. Mustang had been the one to point out that if anyone should take back Earth's Gate, it should be the man who worshiped the earth God Ishvala. Scar's God had been taken from him, just like his people. That was enough to make him sit down and try to be patient with four alchemists trying to teach him their art.

 

They weren't sure how to make things right, but it was a start. This wasn't just about defeating Father, it was about going back and making sure he didn't win. They still lost if Amestris remained empty, if everyone they loved remained dead. So they started discussing time travel. That meant they had to gather more information about theories of relativity and wormholes. Well, at least he and Ed were doing that while the others thought they were looking for supplies.

 

He and Ed had a theory though that Mustang wasn't exactly working with them anymore. Mustang had a family now. He had a son and three daughters with Riza Hawkeye and they were a happy family despite the post-apocalyptic world and the zombie beings trying to eat them on a daily basis. They both loved Mustang's kids, but everyone was very aware of what would happen if the plans succeeded...those kids would cease to exist. If they traveled back in time or if time was regenerated from a set point, those four kids would simply blink out of existence and the odds of conceiving them again almost impossible.

 

So he and Ed searched for answers, once again resorting to books and research to help them raise the dead. They just wanted to go home. After all this time trying not to look back, it's all they could think about anymore: returning home and saving their family. Unfortunately this had also become home for them and a family. Al tried to concentrate on the books in front of him and not think about the faces of their nieces and nephew. The Mustang kids were a source of hope and joy for all of them in a time when there was nothing but death and darkness. He didn't want to have another void in his heart like the one made by losing Nina, this one would be a black hole and would engulf him from the inside out.

 

So which home and which family would he choose? Al hung his head and clamped his eyes shut. It felt like he was torn in two again, just like when he was separated from his body.

 

 


End file.
